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Listening Point - General Discussion

Favorite Wilderness Quotes

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JWilder

03/02/2021 01:38PM

Do you have one? Maybe it is from one of your favorite authors. Maybe it is a proverb. Maybe it is your very own. Maybe it is something that you stand for, or you feel represents who you are. Maybe it is a bumper sticker on your vehicle or better yet on your canoe:) Maybe you repeat it on long, grueling portages.

Quotes speak to us. They can help us when traveling solo. They can create unity and vision for a group. They tell us “I/we can”. They provide us encouragement when we are “embracing the suck”.

I am a huge reader and surprisingly do not have a wilderness quote that represents my love for canoe country or why it is important to me. I am on a quest for these words of wisdom that I can personally utilize or share with others.

What is YOUR favorite wilderness quote?

JW

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Unas10

03/02/2021 01:44PM

"The heavens proclaim the glory of God.
The skies display his craftsmanship.
Day after day they continue to speak;
night after night they make him known.
They speak without a sound or word;
their voice is never heard.
Yet their message has gone throughout the earth,
and their words to all the world."
Psalm 19:1-4 (NLT)

Followed by, "...Be still and know that I am God...", Psalm 46:10 (NIV)

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Speckled

03/02/2021 01:56PM

“Joy comes from simple and natural things; mist over meadows, sunlight on leaves, the path of the moon over water. Even rain and wind and stormy clouds bring joy.”
- Sigurd F. Olson

"Fool me once, shame on...shame on you. Fool me, can't get fooled again" - W

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CityFisher74

03/02/2021 02:22PM

Not outdoors specific, but they certainly can be. Some of my favorites from the legend Yogi Berra:

- When you come to the fork in the road, take it.
- It gets late early out here. (swear I say this every single day around dinnertime in the BWCA)
- You have to be very careful if you don't know where you're going because you might not get there.

"The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders."

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pamonster

03/02/2021 02:34PM

I got 2

"The more you know, the less you have to carry"
- Mors Kochanski

"When the Last Tree Is Cut Down, the Last Fish Eaten, and the Last Stream Poisoned, You Will Realize That You Cannot Eat Money"
- Cree Proverb

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Captn Tony

03/02/2021 02:46PM

Not all that wander are lost.
Gandalf
J.R.R Tolkien

You're going to HELL and you're going to drag me with ya!! -Gunsmoke

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bobbernumber3

03/02/2021 02:50PM

Nobody cares about your vacation like you do.
--My Daughter

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GopherAdventure

03/02/2021 02:52PM

“Into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” -John Muir

“The race is not always to the swift, but to those who keep on moving.”

Tony

Tony

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PineKnot

03/02/2021 03:22PM

"Do what you can, with what you have, where you are".

Teddy Roosevelt

Do what you can, with what you have, where you are -- Teddy Roosevelt

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JimmyJustice

03/02/2021 03:41PM

Like PineKnot, my favorite quote is also below my name. However, bobbernumber3 's daughter speaks the truth.

Fate whispers to the warrior "You cannot withstand the storm" and the warrior whispers back "I am the storm". Unknown.

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fraxinus

03/02/2021 04:07PM

From John McPhee's book " The Survival of the Bark Canoe"

“Travel by canoe is not a necessity, and will nevermore be the most efficient way to get from one region to another, or even from one lake to another anywhere. A canoe trip has become simply a rite of oneness with certain terrain, a diversion off the field, an art performed not because it is a necessity but because there is value in the art itself.”

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bobbernumber3

03/02/2021 04:12PM

JimmyJustice: "Like PineKnot, my favorite quote is also below my name. However, bobbernumber3 's daughter speaks the truth. "

We were in the Galapagos and no one was commenting on our posted pictures...

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Gunwhale

03/02/2021 05:56PM

“Best of all he loved the fall … the fall with the tawny and grey, the leaves yellow on the cottonwoods, leaves floating on the trout streams and above the hills the high blue windless skies. He loved to shoot, he loved to ride and he loved to fish.”

Ernest Hemingway

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Blatz

03/02/2021 06:03PM

"I just have to run faster than you"

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alpinebrule

03/02/2021 06:41PM

As a friend of mine once said, "do you know how hard it is to find a leaf to wipe your a** is in a pine forest?"

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Portage99

03/02/2021 06:47PM

I found this quote in high school. I still remember the exact moment I read it! I thought..."Wow, someone else gets it." I was in the high school library, skipping class & wandering the halls (which was one of my expert skills. :) ) I loved reading the old books in the library.

“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar:
I love not Man the less, but Nature more,
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before,
To mingle with the Universe, and feel
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot all conceal.”

Lord Byron

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NorthstarNick

03/02/2021 09:52PM

“In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life, — no disgrace, no calamity, which nature cannot repair.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson

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bottomtothetap

03/02/2021 11:39PM

“But ask the animals, and they will teach you,
or the birds in the sky, and they will tell you;
or speak to the earth, and it will teach you,
or let the fish in the sea inform you.
Which of all these does not know
that the hand of the Lord has done this?"

Job, 12:7-9

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BonzSF

03/03/2021 12:21AM

I don’t know if it’s a wilderness quote but something passed to me from my Dad
“IF” by Rudyard Kipling. It’s a long poem but here a few lines

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run—
Yours is the Earth and everything in it

Or. Pass the duct tape

"Illegitimi non carborundum"

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LarryS48

03/03/2021 12:52AM

"What sets a canoeing expedition apart is that it purifies you more rapidly and inescapably than any other travel. Travel a thousand miles by train and you are a brute; pedal five hundred miles on a bicycle and you remain basically a bourgeois; paddle a hundred in a canoe and you are already a child of nature."

Pierre Elliott Trudeau

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KarlBAndersen1

03/03/2021 06:49AM

“I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. "

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HistoryDoc

03/03/2021 07:17AM

My favorites generally find their source with that great wilderness sage, Patrick F. McManus.

"Scholars have long known that fishing eventually turns men into philosophers. Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to buy decent tackle on a philosopher's salary."

"Poking a campfire with a stick is one of life's great satisfactions."

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canoe212

03/03/2021 08:08AM

"When through the woods and forest glades I wander" How Great Thou Art

“Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt.” John Muir

“There’s never enough time to do all the nothing you want” Calvin & Hobbes, Bill Watterson

“Not blind opposition to progress, but opposition to blind progress...” John Muir

“Of all the paths you take in life, make sure a few of them are dirt.” John Muir

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Savage Voyageur

03/03/2021 08:14AM

There are many reasons to go fishing.
Catching fish is one of them.

"So many lakes, so little time." WWJD

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AmarilloJim

03/03/2021 08:27AM

Here fishy, fishy, fishy.

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JWilder

03/03/2021 08:48AM

AmarilloJim: "Here fishy, fishy, fishy."

Does it work?

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Jackfish

Moderator

03/03/2021 08:52AM

Mine is in my signature line.

"Keep close to Nature's heart, yourself; and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean." ~ John Muir

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tumblehome

03/03/2021 09:01AM

“Embrace the elements”

A helpful quote when paddling into wind/rain/sleet.

Tom

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Zulu

03/03/2021 09:20AM

This lake can change its personality in a hurry like a women - all smiles one minute dancing a temper tantrum the next.

Dick Proenneke

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bottomtothetap

03/03/2021 10:50AM

My other favorite quote goes a direction180 degrees from my previous post to this thread, and I just COULD NOT post the two of them together! :-)

"Paddle faster, I hear banjo music!"

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Freddy

03/03/2021 10:59AM

See Below!

"Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul" John Muir

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missmolly

03/03/2021 01:24PM

"Don't boat if you can't float." Willy Shakes

I will paddle eternal, Kevlar and carbon.

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BearBurrito

03/03/2021 01:41PM

“Into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” -John Muir

One thorn of experience is worth a whole wilderness of warning

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fadersup

03/03/2021 02:10PM

Something about nature, right, just makes you want to… shit.

~Richard Pryor

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analyzer

03/03/2021 02:21PM

GopherAdventure: "“Into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” -John Muir

Love this one.

Tony"

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analyzer

03/03/2021 02:21PM

This one isn't a Wilderness quote, more like something you say or write to your girlfriend, but in many respects, the BWCA is my gal.... I find myself thinking of her often.

Today,

If a smile,
comes to you,
a happy smile,
that perhaps,
you can't explain....

Then,
it is because,
in that moment,
I am thinking of you~
And smiling too : )~

(Susan politz schultz).

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analyzer

03/03/2021 02:26PM

BonzSF: "I don’t know if it’s a wilderness quote but something passed to me from my Dad
“IF” by Rudyard Kipling. It’s a long poem but here a few lines

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on”;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run—
Yours is the Earth and everything in it

Or. Pass the duct tape"

Love that ending. Too funny!!!

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GutRooster

03/03/2021 03:32PM

It is at this moment of each year that I wish I were a muskrat, eye-deep in the marsh.
~Aldo Leopold

Six days shalt thou paddle and pack but on the seventh day thou shalt wash thy socks. ~Aldo Leopold

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thebotanyguy

03/03/2021 04:13PM

From the book "The Voyageur" by Grace Lee Nute, 1931. In the End Notes, the quotation is credited to James H. Baker, "Lake Superior," Minnesota Historical Collections, 3:342.

"Said one of these men, long past seventy years of age: 'I could carry, paddle, walk and sing with any man I ever saw. I have been twenty-four years a canoe man, and forty-one years in service; no portage was ever too long for me. Fifty songs could I sing. I have saved the lives of ten voyageurs. Have had twelve wives and six running dogs. I spent all my money in pleasure. Were I young again, I should spend my life the same way over. There is no life so happy as a voyageur's life!'"

"Said one of these men, long past seventy years of age: 'I could carry, paddle, walk and sing with any man I ever saw. I have been twenty-four years a canoe man, and forty-one years in service; no portage was ever too long for me. Fifty songs could I sing. I have saved the lives of ten voyageurs. Have had twelve wives and six running dogs. I spent all my money in pleasure. Were I young again, I should spend my life the same way over. There is no life so happy as a voyageur's life!'"

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JWilder

03/03/2021 04:23PM

"Wilderness to the people of America is a spiritual necessity, an antidote to the high pressure of modern life, a means of regaining serenity and equilibrium. "

Sigurd Olson

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schuetpa

03/03/2021 05:54PM

This is one of the greatest posts I have read in a while. I am very excited to put a few of these on my walls in my classroom. I will add a couple more I think but this is one that is always stood out to me and is from the first chapter of Listening Point one of my favorite nature books.

“I named this place Listening Point because only when one comes to listen, only when one is aware and still, can things be seen and heard. Everyone has a listening point somewhere. It does not have to be in the north or close to the wilderness, but someplace of quiet where the universe can be contemplated with awe.”
-- Sigurd F. Olson

and also from that first chapter but a little bit earlier.

“While we are born with curiosity and wonder and our early years full of the adventure they bring, I know such inherent joys are often lost. I also know that, being deep within us, their latent glow can be fanned to flame again by awareness and an open mind.”
-- Sigurd F. Olson

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snakecharmer

03/03/2021 08:11PM

(see below)

"Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing it is not fish they are after"
~ Henry David Thoreau

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JWilder

03/04/2021 06:18AM

"I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion."

Henry David Thoreau

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missmolly

03/04/2021 07:26AM

JWilder: ""I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than be crowded on a velvet cushion."

Henry David Thoreau"

That's my favorite.

I will paddle eternal, Kevlar and carbon.

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HayRiverDrifter

03/04/2021 07:52AM

When my son was four years old, we were out for a family walk in the wilderness. The two of us stopped to relieve ourselves. I looked down and his stream was shooting out about 10 feet with no drop. I said to him "Wow, you can pee really far"

His response: "Ya Dad, when your little you can pee really far, but when your old you can't pee so far."

Another one from the same young boy. After watch Nemo as we were driving into the Great Smokey Mountains, my son says "Actually Mom, fish are not friends, they're food."

"The more energy you put into something, the higher the potential for intense pain." HayRiverDrifter (think potential energy, or kinetic also)

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JWilder

03/04/2021 11:50AM

What a deep well of wisdom AND humor that has been posted here. Thank you everyone. As I continue my quest here is one that stuck out to me.

"At times on quiet waters one does not speak aloud but only in whispers, for then all noise is sacrilege. "
-- Sigurd F. Olson

Grrrr. That one person in your group that doesn't understand this. Should be a pre-trip expectation amongst ALL...

JW

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Porkeater

03/04/2021 12:39PM

"The elemental simplicities of wilderness travel were thrills not only because of their novelty, but because they represented complete freedom to make mistakes. The wilderness gave them their first taste of those rewards and penalties for for wise and foolish acts which every woodsman faces daily, but against which civilization has built a thousand buffers."
- Aldo Leopold

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Portage99

03/04/2021 12:56PM

JWilder: "What a deep well of wisdom AND humor that has been posted here. Thank you everyone. As I continue my quest here is one that stuck out to me.

"At times on quiet waters one does not speak aloud but only in whispers, for then all noise is sacrilege. "
-- Sigurd F. Olson

Grrrr. That one person in your group that doesn't understand this. Should be a pre-trip expectation amongst ALL...

JW"

“All the wonders of life are already here. They’re calling you. If you can listen to them, you will be able to stop running. What you need, what we all need, is silence. Stop the noise in your mind in order for the wondrous sounds of life to be heard. Then you can begin to live your life authentically and deeply.”
? Thích Nh?t H?nh, Silence: The Power of Quiet in a World Full of Noise

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Spartan2

03/04/2021 12:56PM

When we completed our first canoe trip in 1971 we went shopping for souvenirs in Ely. Somewhere (I believe it was Canadian Waters) I found a small packet of note cards with a loon and a quote. I loved them and I used all but one in the next couple of years. But the last one I decided to frame. It still hangs in our home, in a simple little wood frame, and I stop by and read it every once in a while.

Some time ago, probably about 2008-2010, I looked up Roger Drayna on the Internet. He was living in Wausau, Wisconsin. The article about him mentioned work he did for his church, so I contacted the church and asked to be put in touch with him. I sent him a letter, and he replied very graciously. I cannot remember now what magazine this quoted article appeared in--Field and Stream, perhaps. But he was touched that I had contacted him, and he actually sent me a few more copies of the note cards. I just looked him up again last year and discovered that he died in 2012, at the age of 81.

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MagicPaddler

03/04/2021 02:25PM

I have never been lost. I have been confused about my location for a week or two.

The question of the day is Freedom or Socialism?? MagicPaddler

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WHendrix

03/04/2021 03:04PM

"I went along to iron out the wrinkles in my soul" Omond Solandt as quoted by Sigurd Olson,in The Lonely Land, when he was asked why he went on the Churchill River trip.

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RunningFox

03/04/2021 08:16PM

In days of old when men were bold
And toilets not invented
They dropped their load beside the road
And walked away contented

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JWilder

03/05/2021 05:25AM

“Generations come and generations go,
but the earth remains forever.
The sun rises and the sun sets,
and hurries back to where it rises.
The wind blows to the south
and turns to the north;
round and round it goes,
ever returning on its course.
All streams flow into the sea,
yet the sea is never full.
To the place the streams come from,
there they return again.
All things are wearisome,
more than one can say.
The eye never has enough of seeing,
nor the ear its fill of hearing.
What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again;
there is nothing new under the sun.”

--King Solomon (Ecclesiastes 1:4-9)

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allfish

03/05/2021 11:19AM

"Hear the challenge, pay the price, learn the lesson."

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allfish

03/05/2021 11:19AM

"Hear the challenge, pay the price, learn the lesson."

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AlmostCanadian

03/05/2021 11:49AM

This one is in my mind a lot as I'm preparing for a trip. It really gets me excited for the adventure ahead:

“It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to.”
-Bilbo Baggins in J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of The Rings

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Grandma L

03/05/2021 12:23PM

Thank you all for the wonderful words. I will use them well. Print, frame, hang and read! or, quote to the grandchildren!

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JimmyJustice

03/05/2021 01:55PM

Grandma L: "Thank you all for the wonderful words. I will use them well. Print, frame, hang and read! or, quote to the grandchildren! "

GL, fee free to use this classic grandparent quote: "Your head is for more than wearing a hat". I heard it often...

Fate whispers to the warrior "You cannot withstand the storm" and the warrior whispers back "I am the storm". Unknown.

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JWilder

03/06/2021 07:25AM

After days of quote searching (this thread and elsewhere). I have collected an arsenal of wisdom. When people ask me about why I "vacation" where I do I can say, “Simplicity in all things is the secret of the wilderness and one of its most valuable lessons. It is what we leave behind that is important. I think the matter of simplicity goes further than just food, equipment, and unnecessary gadgets; it goes into the matter of thoughts and objectives as well. When in the wilds, we must not carry our problems with us or the joy is lost.”--Sigurd F. Olson

When people give me funny looks and inquire as to why I would even think of going on a trip solo, I can say "I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time. To be in company, even with the best, is soon wearisome and dissipating. I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.” -- Henry David Thoreau

And to sum up this thread, I will end with this. “There are some who can live without wild things, and some who cannot. These essays are the delights and dilemmas of those who cannot” - Aldo Leopold

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chessie

03/07/2021 10:09AM

I once saw b & w footage of my great aunt and uncle white water canoeing. This was maybe < 100 years ago (!). They had a friend who was a dentist, and he'd acquired one of the first video cameras made available. My aunt & uncle were avid canoers; they'd buy a new Old Town about every year, trading in their used one. In this video, they are dressed to the nines, and they run the rapids/white water, hop out, portage back up river, and run it again, and again - for the sheer joy of it. They did not quit canoeing until quite late in life, as my Aunt Roberta told it: we quit because Uncle Jim's oxygen tanks were just too hard to manage in the canoe! In any event, I once gave them a paddle I'd made into a coat/hat hanger, with these words wood-burned into it (I don't know who originated this quote):
"Paddler upon life's seas
To thin own self be true
Whatever thy lot may be
Paddle thine own canoe."

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gravelroad

03/08/2021 06:20PM

The standard by which I judge every trip into the backcountry, courtesy of Calvin Rutstrum’s “Paradise Below Zero”:

“Now damn it, we can holler for help and no one will hear us.”

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ppine

03/10/2021 11:07AM

I like Dead lyrics. I read them as poetry. I recite them as invocations.

"Going home, going home
By the waterside I will rest my bones
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul"
Brokedown Palace 1970

"I have seen where the wolf has slept
by the silver stream
I can tell, by the mark he left you were in his
dream
Ah, child of countless trees
An, child of boundless seas
What you are, is what you're meant to be
Speaks his name, though you were born to me,
Born to me,
Cassidy.
Cassidy, 1974

The old ways are the best ways.

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JWilder

03/10/2021 11:20AM

"Rock and roots, rocks and roots. Sure do a number on my socks and boots." -- Jerry Vandiver

This gets stuck in my head all the time. I just sing it out loud and pass it on to whoever is within listening distance :)

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awbrown

03/10/2021 12:47PM

"I'd rather wake up in the middle of nowhere than in any city on Earth."........Steve McQueen.

I set a goal of losing 10 lbs. this year. I only have 15 left to lose.

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Pilgrimpaddler

03/10/2021 04:18PM

ppine: "I like Dead lyrics. I read them as poetry. I recite them as invocations.

"Going home, going home
By the waterside I will rest my bones
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul"
Brokedown Palace 1970

"I have seen where the wolf has slept
by the silver stream
I can tell, by the mark he left you were in his
dream
Ah, child of countless trees
An, child of boundless seas
What you are, is what you're meant to be
Speaks his name, though you were born to me,
Born to me,
Cassidy.
Cassidy, 1974"

+1 on Dead lyrics!

Just put one foot in front of the other; eventually you'll get there.

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missmolly

03/10/2021 05:13PM

It might be bad form, but I'll quote myself: "Maybe the dream is why I seek muskies, why I’ll seek for days, heaving bright billy-clubs bristling with hooks until my back’s an angry tangle of aches. Is it my subconscious, seeking the stuff of the dream, that launches me on gray days best kept at bay by stout walls and the fire of a furnace?"

I will paddle eternal, Kevlar and carbon.

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missmolly

03/10/2021 05:51PM

I'll quote myself again: "When I was young and limber, I’d rise around sunrise. No more; I rise at four, when the sleeping bag is warmest and the day is coolest. I go because the gloaming, unlike me, is still young and the bass are ready to rise to a fly in the hushing fog."

I will paddle eternal, Kevlar and carbon.

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JWilder

03/10/2021 05:58PM

missmolly: "I'll quote myself again: "When I was young and limber, I’d rise around sunrise. No more; I rise at four, when the sleeping bag is warmest and the day is coolest. I go because the gloaming, unlike me, is still young and the bass are ready to rise to a fly in the hushing fog.""

No harm nor foul with self quotes:)

Outstanding!!

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kirkfish

03/10/2021 08:03PM

"Eat when you're hungry, sleep when you're tired" is our family line that I think sums up the pleasant state of mind mid trip when one is not sure or concerned what time or even day it is

Eat when you're hungry, sleep when you're tired

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kirkfish

03/10/2021 08:15PM

Pilgrimpaddler: "
ppine: "I like Dead lyrics. I read them as poetry. I recite them as invocations.

"Going home, going home
By the waterside I will rest my bones
Listen to the river sing sweet songs
to rock my soul"
Brokedown Palace 1970

"I have seen where the wolf has slept
by the silver stream
I can tell, by the mark he left you were in his
dream
Ah, child of countless trees
An, child of boundless seas
What you are, is what you're meant to be
Speaks his name, though you were born to me,
Born to me,
Cassidy.
Cassidy, 1974"

+1 on Dead lyrics!"

Indeed, Indeed- Robert Hunter of course in particular was as much a poet as anything... add Garcia, Weir, Barlow.....

Sugar Magnolia is another obvious water/nature choice, but there are so many

Sweet blossom come on under the willow
We can have high times if you'll abide
We can discover the wonders of nature
Rolling in the rushes down by the riverside

Eat when you're hungry, sleep when you're tired

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Blatz

03/10/2021 09:31PM

Zulu: "This lake can change its personality in a hurry like a women - all smiles one minute dancing a temper tantrum the next.

Dick Proenneke"

Why he spent a lot of time alone?

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AdmAckbar13

03/11/2021 12:05PM

“The way of a canoe is the way of the wilderness, and of a freedom almost forgotten.”
— Sigurd F. Olson

“The way of a canoe is the way of the wilderness, and of a freedom almost forgotten.” — Sigurd F. Olson

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ppine

03/11/2021 12:52PM

It was the reading of certain authors like Carson, Thoreau, Muir, Leopold, Marshall and Pinchot that started me down the path to becoming a forester. I carry them with me. They determined my Path, not just something to do on weekends.

Working in the field all the time can be confusing. It makes it hard to have a house, a wife and a dog. Time off in busy field season, and I just wanted to stay home and sleep in a bed and be able to take a shower. Be careful about intertwining your vocation and your vacation. It takes some discipline to keep them separate.

The old ways are the best ways.

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BAWaters

03/11/2021 01:10PM

JWilder: "
AmarilloJim: "Here fishy, fishy, fishy."

Does it work?"

Only if your raise the pitch of your voice a bit when you say it.

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LarryS48

03/11/2021 01:59PM

ppine: "It was the reading of certain authors like Carson, Thoreau, Muir, Leopold, Marshall and Pinchot that started me down the path to becoming a forester. I carry them with me. They determined my Path, not just something to do on weekends.

Working in the field all the time can be confusing. It makes it hard to have a house, a wife and a dog. Time off in busy field season, and I just wanted to stay home and sleep in a bed and be able to take a shower. Be careful about intertwining your vocation and your vacation. It takes some discipline to keep them separate. "

I hope you find your career choice rewarding.

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tobywan

03/11/2021 04:34PM

“One final paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am - a reluctant enthusiast....a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; You will outlive the bastards.”

? Edward Abbey

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TrailZen

03/11/2021 04:45PM

Henry Van Dyke: "It is better to burn the candle at both ends, and in the middle, too, than to put it away in the closet and let the mice eat it."

Mark Twain: "Why not go out on a limb? That's where all the fruit is."

TZ

If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together. African Proverb

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LindenTree

03/11/2021 06:40PM

ppine: Be careful about intertwining your vocation and your vacation. It takes some discipline to keep them separate. "

Pinyon or Ponderosa ppine?

That is some good advise coming from one forester to another, something I've often struggled with.

May the rivers be crooked and winding, and your portages lonesome, leading to the most amazing view.

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Abbey

03/11/2021 09:38PM

When I saw the question about a quote, I instantly knew this was the one. I was getting a bit disappointed that Abbey wasn’t better represented, so thank you for posting before I could get to it.

tobywan: "
“One final paragraph of advice: do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am - a reluctant enthusiast....a part-time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure. It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can. While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in your head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much; I promise you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those desk-bound men and women with their hearts in a safe deposit box, and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators. I promise you this; You will outlive the bastards.”

? Edward Abbey "

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TRadam

03/11/2021 10:28PM

"There are no words that can tell the hidden spirit of the wilderness, that can reveal its mystery, its melancholy, and its charm."

Or

"The beauty and charm of the wilderness are his for the asking, for the edges of the wilderness lie close beside the beaten roads of the present travel."

Theodore Roosevelt

Life is an adventure. Treat it as such.

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ppine

03/12/2021 09:12PM

I have been retired for 20 years. I still am fascinated by wildland plant ecosystems. I would not change a thing in my career. Looking at forests is my favorite thing to do. They all tell a story if you know what you are looking at.

Ponderosa pine has been my specialty for 50 years. Ppine is on the license plate of my pickemup. I like to paddle in forests best. Some of them are in the mountains and hard to handle in a canoe, so I have gone to rafts and drift boats more over the years.

The old ways are the best ways.

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ppine

03/12/2021 09:12PM

It was time in the mountains that got me started. Dad took us out of school starting in the third grade to go deer hunting over night. We grew up in the outdoors. Then is was quotes and reading of the authors we are talking about that stirred the imagination. I moved West 50 years ago. I had to.

The old ways are the best ways.

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ForestDuff

03/12/2021 09:42PM

Outside -by The Fixx

Outside, I stretch the mind that hides within

New pride, I lose four walls that keep me tied

Outside, I breathe new air that reaches me

Fresh tide, does all the cleansing life can give

Tongue-tied, no words will match this point of view

Chastise, I don't belong as no-one owns
Washing, flowing, taking all my fears away
Rushing, blowing, touching gives all life a grace
Washing, flowing, taking all my fears away
Outside

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ForestDuff

03/12/2021 10:03PM

As for true quotes and being a fan of solo canoe and solo winter toboggan trips for the last dozen years.

The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready, and it may be a long time before they get off.- Henry David Thoreau

All a man had to do was to keep his head, and he was all right. Any man who was a man could travel alone. - Jack London

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HistoryDoc

03/13/2021 06:20AM

The old Army quote: " It is simply mind over matter. I don't mind and you don't matter." Lay that on your group at the start of the portage.

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ledhead

03/14/2021 09:52AM

“If more people truly understood what is important in life, there would be a shortage of fishing poles”

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Mocha

03/14/2021 12:33PM

ppine: "It was the reading of certain authors like Carson, Thoreau, Muir, Leopold, Marshall and Pinchot that started me down the path to becoming a forester. I carry them with me. They determined my Path, not just something to do on weekends.

Working in the field all the time can be confusing. It makes it hard to have a house, a wife and a dog. Time off in busy field season, and I just wanted to stay home and sleep in a bed and be able to take a shower. Be careful about intertwining your vocation and your vacation. It takes some discipline to keep them separate. "

Very true. My vocation was my vacation for 30 years. I took lots of trips vicariously, sometimes routing clients where is like to go and then grilling them to no end upon their return.
I also got in some awesome trips, just not enough. Never enough.

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Mocha

03/14/2021 12:43PM

North to Alaska. That's the best I can come up with after a these other better educated quotes

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cowdoc

03/14/2021 07:55PM

"For me, and for thousands with similar inclinations, the most important passion of life is the overpowering desire to escape periodically from the clutches of a mechanistic civilization. To us the enjoyment of solitude, complete independence, and the beauty of undefiled panoramas is absolutely essential to happiness."

Bob Marshall

"What could happen?"

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BadgerFan

03/15/2021 09:11AM

I was also going to post the Edward Abbey quote. It's always been my favorite.

Another of his quotes always reminds me of canoe country. Although he wrote it about Arches National Park, I think of it at almost every campsite I've ever stayed: “This is the most beautiful place on earth. There are many such places.”

To me, the wilderness provides the perfect opportunity to find your most beautiful place on earth and “breathe deep of that yet sweet and lucid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, the lovely, mysterious, and awesome space.”

Carpe Alces

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butthead

03/15/2021 11:37AM

Pardon my vulgarity but this quote has hung in my head for a long time.
My paddling partner on our first trip to Quetico was out on a rock cleaning fish and yelled at the swarming seagulls "DON'T SH-- ON ME!!!".
That phrase stayed with us over the next decade (1980's), till our group went their own ways. I still live near the organizing member and we still share this greeting!

butthead

"never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups" George Carlin

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1JimD

03/15/2021 12:29PM

Keep your Paddle Wet , and your Seat Dry !

Keep your paddle wet and your seat dry!

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bobbernumber3

03/15/2021 01:54PM

Duff: "
The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait till that other is ready, and it may be a long time before they get off.- Henry David Thoreau
"

Very nice Duff!

I'm waiting for some buddies to retire. This makes me smile.

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JWilder

03/15/2021 02:08PM

Stick this one in your back pocket.

"At home I have a protected environment. I can control it. Insulated, heated, or air-conditioned, I surround myself with a climate that accentuates my self-centered world. The Boundary Waters change that, if only for a brief time. Here I am at the mercy of the environment. Unable to control my surroundings, I am sensitive to what's happening around me. I cannot move through here with myself at the center. Whether I want to or not, I am forced to give up my self-centeredness; I am only a part of the world. The environment puts me aside and helps make room for new discoveries. Creation can speak to me and be heard. When the self is given up, I discover great joy. Is it any wonder that I hunger to return here again and again?"
- Andrew Rogness

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